This is a Message Board Post that is gatewayed to this mailing list. Classification: Query Message Board URL: http://boards.ancestry.com/mbexec/msg/an/ic.2ADE/1042 Message Board Post: Hi, as most of you know Ben Hill County, Georgia was not created until 1906 and other counties which were cut out of old Irwin County. I am finding a lot of articles about people who live in the surrounding counties, such as Berrien, Coffee, Colquitt, Dodge, Dooly, Doughterty, Pulaski, Telfair, Tift, Wilcox and others in these old papers. The first transcriptions are online now and I am transcribing more daily. Each week I will load the latest transcriptions to the webpages where the newspaper transcriptions are located. Rather than only transcribe the highlights, marriages, deaths, births, and other vital records, I am also transcribing where people came from, where people moved to, where they worked, who they worked for. Did they add a story to their home, office building, did they attend a meeting. School room news is included, church news is included. Statewide information is included. Anything of historical, genealogical value is being transcribed. As I go along I am also photographing what images there are that would be of historical or genealogical value to researchers. Using a digital camera on a non glare film reader works fine if the lighting is right. In the late 1890s most of the images were drawings rather than photographs and there are not many of local citizens. However, in later editions I hope to find many of our ancestor's images online. If you have any copies of clippings from the Fitzgerald or Ocilla newspapers for the years 1996 to 1997 I would appreciate your sharing them with others as those issues are not included in the collection that has been photocopied and archived. Do visit the pages and if you find your own ancestors and the names are misspelled or if you have some family information to add don't hesitate to contact me as all family information, photos of your ancestors or of the landmarks is appreciated. It is nice to put a face with the names found in these articles. Did you know that Fitzgerald had saloons? Did you know that they had a beautiful opera house? That famous theatical acts came to town and people traveled from one town to another by chartered train cars to see the plays featured in Fitzgerald, Tifton and other cities where they had Opera Houses? Our ancestors did not lead dull lives but very full and interesting lives. Without cable t.v., computers and all of the modern conviences we have they may have not wanted to trade places with us if given the opportunity. What fun it is to travel back in time through these old papers. Hope you will enjoy what you find on the pages and will let me know if you approve. There are only 64 more rolls of film to go. <smile> http://home.comcast.net/~gholback/b_np.htm Kind Regards, Gloria